National health insurance - Research Paper Example

The current system of health care in the United States is perceived as being expensive and providing a level of care that is substandard, because fifteen percent of Americans do not have any kind of health insurance at all, while more than thirty percent of Americans are…

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This essay argues that the United States should reform its health insurance system and switch to a national system because the current system is not working.
The World Health Organization released a report in 2000, which set out three goals of a fair and just health care system. These are: (a) providing good health (b) responsiveness, i.e, satisfying peoples’ expectations of respect and care from health care providers and (c) ensuring that costs are distributed according to an individual’s ability to pay. (www.ddl.umaine. edu).
Japan has a nationalised health care system, whereby health care services such as preventive measures for certain diseases, pre-natal health care and similar mandatory services are provided by the Government, but specialized health care required by individuals is funded through a universal health care system, i.e, employee insurance. As pointed out by Harden (2009), the Japanese system costs half as much but achieves much better outcomes as compared to the United States. In the case of Sweden, health care is funded through a combination of state funding, taxes, social insurance and patient fees (Gennser, 1999).
The advantages offered by the partially nationalised systems of health care in both these countries is: (a) lower costs of the system to patients (b) access to health care by all citizens and (c) better health outcomes, because people are able to approach health care centres and get basic medical check up procedures performed on an ongoing basis to detect serious medical conditions early on.
There are also however, some problems which have manifested in these systems in most developed nations. For instance, Gennser (1999) points out that one of these problems is the overall increase in health care costs over a ten year period, while productivity fell. This was caused largely by increased employment of health professionals, but a lack of optimal use of the available manpower. Secondly, there is a general decrease in
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This rise outweighs the rise in income and is not in line with the current inflation. On average, an American pays close to $7,000 dollars per year in health insurance cost, while a citizen in the next-highest-developed country pays $ 3,000. One would think that the cost is justified by good Medicare given to US citizens but this is not the case.

The current medical health care has faced tremendous changes due to high competitiveness in the medical sector. As such, there has been a need to adopt computerization in the programs undertaken across the health sector.

Great steps have been notable in the matters of infant mortality rate, life expectancy and the general reduced mortality rates because of better health care as compared with the yester years. Great steps in reforming the medical system as we have it today in the United States dates back from the first quarter of the twentieth century where reformist took shape of the system to protect workers from wage losses as well as the escalating medical costs.

Whether poor or rich, children, women, and men have a right to fair treatment. Secondly, America must create national health care system to provide quality health services to be very effective to everyone. It is very ironical that this happens in one of the most advanced countries (Simmons 76).

Universal Health Care
The method through which the payments are facilitated for the health care extended to the citizens tend to vary much depending on the municipality or the country providing the universal health care. In the recent times with the ensuing of debates as to the right of the citizens to have a ready access to the health services, the concept of universal health care has gained much importance (Dixon & Scheurell, 2002).

The health care system of Nigeria is characterised by a low performance of the government in promoting the accessibility of quality health care services. There is also lack of health care facilities for patients with chronic diseases and terminal illness.

A member of the health care team experiencing low morale may perform at a lower standard of practice than usual.” (Beyea, 2004).
Low morale problems among health care staff can be rooted in various reasons. It can be caused by the

3). France’s health expenditures in 2000 amounted to 9.5% of its gross domestic product (GDP), which was a bit lower than that of the United States (Latry et al., 2010, p. 743).
The French healthcare system is government funded operating under a

The focus will be on the government’s health insurance service by outlining its weaknesses and strengths.
The government’s health insurance, The National Government Insurance Company (NHIC) allows the citizens who are paying the insurance to visit any hospital

2 Pages(500 words)Research Paper

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